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April 2004

'Newsweek' columnist warns against early withdrawal from Iraq

Newsweek columnist Fareed Zakaria, left, talks with Jacksonville resident Gilchrist Berg prior to the journalist's UNF lecture last month.

By Marcia Mattson
Freelance Writer

The United States was right to oust Saddam Hussein, but it is planning to leave Iraq too quickly, before it has laid a good foundation for democracy, according to Newsweek foreign affairs editor Fareed Zakaria.

“We did that,” Zakaria said, referring to another nation in turmoil. “It’s called Haiti.”

Zakaria spoke in late February at the University Center to discuss his recent book, The Future of Freedom: Illiberal Democracy at Home and Abroad, in the context of current events in Iraq.

Zakaria also is editor of Newsweek International and writes a regular foreign affairs column. Esquire magazine named him the Most Influential Foreign Policy Advisor of His Generation.

Zakaria earned his bachelor’s degree from Yale University and his doctorate in international relations from Harvard University. His visit concluded a week of inaugural events for PresidentJohn Delaney.

“You may not realize, but we have a 51st state. It’s called Iraq,” Zakaria said. “If you break it, you buy it. So here we are.”

Creating a democracy in Iraq is crucial to preventing future terrorist acts, Zakaria said. He believes there was no connection between ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States. But he said dysfunctional Arab regimes in general are breeding discontented and desperate young men who are focusing their frustration on America.

“If a decent, pluralist government succeeds — or if it fails — it will send a profound message to the Arab world,” Zakaria said. “We must change the status quo. The status quo is what got us 9-11.

He believes the U.S. timetable to leave Iraq in July is too quick, particularly since Iraq won’t have held its elections by then. The United States will have to leave Iraq to an interim government with no experience in democracy.

“When you get in there, stay there,” he advised. “Work at institutional reform. Because you have one shot at it.”

If the fledgling government falls apart, he said, the United States won’t get a second chance to work with the Iraqi people. It also takes time to train police, attorneys, courts and other infrastructure.

Zakaria noted that he believed the United States made mistakes in not sending enough ground troops to help with the rebuilding phase and in underestimating the growth of criminal activity during Iraq’s decade of living under sanctions.

“The Americans on the ground are doing extraordinary work,” Zakaria said. “The problem they face is they are not going to have a lot of time to do it.”

The Middle East has a history of failed secularism, including Hussein’s regime, he said. Leaders for the last 45 years have pretended to be Western secularists but actually imposed tyrannies that discredited secularism and made people believe the better alternative was Islamic politicians.

Zakaria said the United States should let other entities, such as the United Nations, participate in rebuilding Iraq, if only to help the U.S. government achieve its goals for a democracy.

“Some say, ‘Why do you want the UN? It’s so ineffective.’ I say that’s precisely the point. It doesn’t frighten anyone,” Zakaria said.

The use of oil proceeds, for instance, must be addressed for the benefit of the Iraqi people. But the United States cannot do this because it has been accused too often of entering Iraq to gain control of its oil, an accusation Zakaria called “ludicrous.”

The governments of most oil-rich nations don’t have to build an economy or tax residents who could then expect certain services in return.

“So if they have elections, you don’t see real democracy because the government does not have to have a genuine relationship with its people,” he said.

However, some governments, such as Kuwait, have placed oil revenues in trust to be distributed among its citizens or used for their benefit, he noted.

Another key to Iraq’s success is to create a government rich in diversity, with regional authorities or competing houses of government so there is no “winner-takes-all system.”

Zakaria also touched on the concerns about globalization of trade, suggesting that the United States should help set standards for earnings, ethics and other issues.

“Let’s try to do something that says America left its mark on the world for the better,” Zakaria said. “It’s what we have done for so much of our history.”